It was near dinner time when they returned. After dinner he took him to his room, and producing a pack of cards, invited him to play.
"Cards!" exclaimed Max. "I don't know anything about playing with them, and don't want to."
"Why not? are you too pious?" Ralph asked with a sneer, tumbling them out in a heap upon the table.
"I've always been taught that men gamble with cards, and that gambling is very wicked and disgraceful, quite as bad as getting drunk."
"Pooh! you're a muff!"
"I'd rather be a muff than a gambler, any day," returned Max with spirit.
"Pshaw! 'tisn't gambling, unless you play for money, and I haven't asked you to do that, and don't propose to. Come now, take a hand," urged Ralph persuasively. "There isn't a bit more harm in it than in a game of ball."
"But I don't know how," objected Max.
"I'll teach you," said Ralph. "You'll soon learn and will find it good sport."
At length Max yielded, though not without some qualms of conscience which he tried to quiet by saying to himself, "Papa never said I shouldn't play in this way; only that gambling was very wicked, and I must never go where it was done."